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migrating PST to secondary server

I want to stop working with PST (we think about archiving solution for the long run).

I have a solution that I want to examine and understand the limitation.We use Exchange 2003

I want to create a new server, open a secondary mailbox for every user and migrate the all PST file to that mailbox. we have about 150Gb of PST file so I want to use local storage and give every use quota of about 2Gb.

The main mailbox will have a qouta of 500mb and instead of uing PST they will use the secondary server.

We use PST on the network and have alot of problems.

Any opinion about this solution ( I/O issue ? , performance, what do i risk? )

PST files should never be used across the network. Aside from the fact you risk corruption to the PST file itself you also absolutely hammer the network itself. Try running perfmon and have a look at the results. There are products you can use for archiving email. Have you had a look at GFI Mail Archiver, Symantec Enterprise Vault or Zantaz EAS maybe? If you have a second server you still have an outlay for the software and hardware plus you will still have users hitting the 2GB at some point. It may be better to invest in an archiving solution now rather than a shorter term workaround. That is of course only my opinion though.

cheers
Andy

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Comment

Accessing a PST file across the network is not supported by Microsoft.
If you have a large number of PST files then I would be looking to purchase an archiving solution that can import those PST files straight, rather than going through Exchange. I know GFI Mail Archiver can do that, I suspect that others can as well.

The solution that you have suggested isn't really going to work. Users will have two mailboxes and will be constantly moving data around. It will be unpopular and most likely fail to achieve what you want it to.